Elections on Tuesday in California, New Jersey and other states are unfolding as the Trump administration’s immigration raids have spread fear in Latino communities across the country. That fear of Immigration and Customs Enforcement activity has become an X factor in this week’s elections.
Democratic officials and Latino voting-rights activists worry that the ICE crackdown will dampen Latino turnout and that the presence of Justice Department election monitors at polling sites in California and New Jersey will intimidate voters. Voter data of the turnout so far in California, New Jersey and Virginia shows that Latino participation is roughly in pace with past elections.
And for some Latino voters, the Trump administration’s escalation of force appears to be not a deterrent to casting a ballot but a motivation.
Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials said in a statement that the agency was not planning immigration enforcement actions targeting polling locations and that its operations are “intelligence-driven.” The statement said, however, that “if a dangerous criminal alien is near a polling location, they may be arrested as a result of that targeted enforcement action.”
Last week, the Justice Department announced it would monitor elections in six counties with large Latino populations in California and New Jersey, at the request of Republican Party officials in those states.
Latino Republicans dismissed any concerns raised by Democrats that the ICE raids or Justice Department election monitoring might hurt Hispanic turnout.
Rudy Melendez, 57, a lighting technician in the North Hollywood section of Los Angeles and a conservative, scoffed at the notion that a U.S. citizen would hesitate to vote because of a crackdown on unauthorized immigrants. If turnout ends up being low, he said, it could be because voters tend to be less tuned in to off-year special elections. “People are going to vote if they want to vote,” he said.
State Senator Suzette Martinez Valladares, a Republican from Santa Clarita, said that if Latino voter turnout was low in the California election, it would be because of “frustrations on all sides,” not because of federal agents or monitors.
